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OUR 



LITTLE MONARCHY: 



Who Runs It, 



And What ]t Costs 



By F. C. ADAMS, 

JTHOR OF THK BIEGK OF WASHINGTON \ND OTHER WORKS. 



WASHINGTON, D. C. 

18 7 3. 

FOR SALE BY 

F. A. FILLS & CO., Cor. N. Y. Ave. and 15th St. 

And by all Bookseller*. 



- f 






;<■ 8, fourteenth Jfine from top, acts of government should read 
lW of gqvernmeryi." 

Pag'a 16, tenth Jfin« from bottom, the word different should read 
1 differently." 

Pjige 17, in tfeie ninth rind twenty-first line from the top, the word 
effected occurs instead of "affected." 

On page 28, fourth line from bottom, for < $2,80 " read "$2,800." 



OUR 



LITTLE MONARCHY: 



Who Runs It, 



AND WHAT IT COSTS 



By F. C. ADAMS, 

AUTHOR OF THE SIEGE OF WASHINGTON AND OTHER WORKS. 



WASHINGTON, D. C. 

1873. 

For Sale by F. A. FILLS & CO., Cor. N. Y. Ave. and 15th St., 

And by all Bookseller*. 



HAVE WE A MONARCHY? 



Letter ISIo. 1 . 

Many persons may regard this as a very singular and inappro- 
priate question, living, as we do, in what is called a great free 
Republic, and under the very shadow of its Capitol. It may, 
indeed, seem strange to many persons that I should even ask the 
question. And yet it is an undeniable fact that we have got a 
monarchical government in form and features, and these features 
of the very worst kind, in Washington. It was our boast during 
the war that we had the best government the world ever saw. 
I propose to prove that we have here in Washington the worst 
government the world ever saw. I say it is the worst govern- 
ment the world ever saw, because it is a selfish, personal, and 
irresponsible government, a government that sets justice and 
right at defiance, and the highest object of which, as experience 
has already shown, is to steal from the rich and oppress the 
poor. I mean these things in their broadest sense. Stealing from 
the rich is not an uncommon crime in this country. It is only 
criminal when you steal not exactly in accordance with law. As 
to the punishment, that depends very much on the amount you 
steal. Steal a million or so and you are as fine a fellow as ever 
the law elevated into a hero, or touched with dainty gloves. 
Your petty thief, who steals only a coat or a pair of shoes to cover 
his naked feet, will, of a surety feel the rigors of the law, and be 
sent to the penitentiary. 

I have said we have a government that steals from the rick 
and oppresses the poor. And what is more strange, is the fact 
that a Republican Congress gave it power to do both these things, 
A year's experience proves that this new Territorial Government, 
or rather the men who control it, are inspired only by selfish mo- 
tives, and use their power to make money. And they not only 
oppress the poor man, but they claim the right to control his 
labor in the interest of a corrupt political clique. They also 
claim the right to take possession of the poor man's little proper- 



ty, accumulated by hard labor and frugality, and deny him the 
right of consulting either his pocket or his taste in the improve- 
ments they shall put on it. Experience has already shown that 
the sole object of these men is to " improve" the poor man out 
of his property, and, by forming a corrupt ring, get possession 
of it themselves. These men assume the exclusive right of say- 
ing what " improvements" shall be put on every man's property. 
And if the poor man has not the means of paying for these im- 
provements, and in nine cases out of ten he has not, then these 
men will sell him out and drive him from his home. Already 
the work of selHng these poor people out has begun, and with a 
harshness and cruelty sad to contemplate. 

HOW AND FOR WHAT OBJECT THIS NEW "TERRITORIAL GOV- 
ERNMENT" WAS ESTABLISHED. 

Washington had, as is well-known, an old fashioned Muni- 
cipal Government, simple in its form and economical in its work- 
ings. The experience of live hundred years has shown that this 
form of government, properly administered, is the best and most 
economical for large cities. Ours was not a model municipal 
government. It needed improving and so shaping as to meet the 
demands of the times. But it was cheaply administered ; under 
it our improvements were going on steadily and economically, 
and the people had the right of choosing their own rulers. The 
most responsible, honest and thinking portion of our people were 
contented with this form of government. The laws were res- 
pected, the checks upon official power good, and the opportu- 
nities for plunder small indeed. The only men discontented with 
this form of government were a number of well-known contract- 
ors and pavers who wanted to control the paving jobs, and who 
were notorious in Washington for their selfishness. 

You could count these men on your fingers' ends ; but by 
seducing the press from its legitimate duties, they gained a pow- 
erful influence for evil ; and they did this by keeping up a clamor 
against the government at home and misrepresenting it abroad. 
Two or three of these men were known to our people as energetic 
and enterprising ; but they belonged to that type of men of which 
Mr. Tweed, of New York, was a good example, and in whose 
hands political power is sure to be made a dangerous and cor- 
rupting instrument. These men, as it has turned out, clamored 
against our municipal government simply because they could not 
use it to advance the schemes of plunder they had set their hearts 
on. That there was no sincerity in all this clamor against our 



municipal government, and that it was raised for a bad pmpose, 
is shown by the fact that the very men they were loudest in de- 
nouncing as corrupt tools were the first taken into their confi- 
dence and employ when the government was changed. If these 
men were so notoriously bad and corrupt under the old gov- 
ernment, why is it that the new government is in such haste to 
take them into its confidence and give them places of trust and 
responsibility ? This was the question our honest, thinking peo- 
ple asked. Their appearance in the new government was the 
signal for alarm on the part of our people. Their appearance in 
the new government, and patronized by the very men who 
had denounced them as scoundrels, made our people instinctively 
feel that a system of plunder on a gigantic scale had been de- 
vised and was about to be carried out. Experience has shown 
that these fears on the part of our people were well 
founded. 

The experience of a year has also proved that all the clamor 
raised by these bold, bad men against our old municipal govern- 
ment, and the way it was administered, was for the purpose of 
practising a deception on Congress, and getting a government 
they could so manage, under a pretence of improvements, as to 
parcel contracts out among themselves and fill their own pock- 
ets. And that is what these men are doing now. I venture to 
assert, that in no other country in the world where the English 
language is spoken would anything so shameful and audacious 
have been tolerated. It was, in fact, nothing less than changing 
one form of government for another, destroying a good and res- 
ponsible one, and giving the people a bad and irresponsible one; 
and all this for the accommodation of a few designing men 
known to the people as desperate and unscrupulous speculators. 
The same thing was done in New York for the accommodation 
of Mr. Wm. M. Tweed ; and with his example before them our 
" improvers " not only copied, but so improved on the original, 
that Wm. M. Tweed's exploits have been eclipsed in a single 
year. 

Let us see who were the men that went before Congress and 
got it to destroy our municipal government, and give us a mo- 
narchical government in all its forms and features. Let us see 
who they are that we may the better judge of their motives, 
Chief among them was Mr. A. R. Shepherd, a plumber and gas- 
fitter, a large shareholder and master spirit in several " street 
paving companies;" Henry D. Cooke, our present Governor, and 



the great moving spirit of the Seneca Sandstone Ring ; Hallet 
Kilbourn, a real estate agent and general speculator ; S. P. Brown, 
government contractor; Dr. John L. Kid well, notorious as 
president of the Seneca Sandstone Company, and so patriotic 
during the war that he was caught serving his country on both 
sides; and Lewis Clephane, president of several paving com- 
panies, and owner of at least half a dozen patents for paving 
streets. There was a conspiracy of Ring interests here; and that 
it was concocted for a selfish purpose was only too apparent. 
flow strongly. the street paving jobbers and the Seneca sand- 
stone ring jobbers have arrayed themselves in this movement 
could be seen at a glance. It were worse than folly to suppose 
that any of these men cared a straw for the interests of the peo- 
ple, or intended to give us a better and more economical govern- 
ment. They were the last things such desperate and reckless 
men would think of. They wanted power as a means of making 
money ; and they wanted a government so constructed as to make 
their acts of violence and plunder appear as if done under cover 
of law. 

The most remarkable thing in the history of this shameful 
conspiracy is, that a Republican Congress should have been so 
deceived by it, and have fallen as it were blindfold into the trap. 
To change a form of government at the bid of ten or a dozen noto- 
torious jobbers and contractors was, to say the least, something 
new and unusual in the history of government. And there was a 
time in our history when it would have shocked the moral sense 
of our people. It was also more remarkable because not one of these 
men who asked Congress to commit this act of folly and injustice, 
had ever done anything to merit either the confidence or the respect 
of the Republican party. Most of them had not even claimed to be 
Republicans until the war was over ; and then only attached them- 
selves to the party because they found it profitable to do so. Dur- 
ing the war these men might have been found at home engaged 
in jobs, and making money out of the misfortunes of the country. 
After the war they were known in this district as " A.ndy John- 
son copperheads." The meaning of this epithet is sufficiently well 
understood here in Washington. And, too, with a single ex- 
ception, these m^n had been active and outspoken opponents of 
what was called "negro suffrage.' In truth, they had nothing 
in sympathy with the colored man, and were, and had long been, 
his bitterest enemies in this District They affected to fear that 
if the colored man were enfranchised his vote would be controlled 



t 

by demagogues against the best interests of the city. But expe- 
rience has shown that this was only a pretence. Controlling the 
poor colored man's vote, and making his labor depend on it, and 
using it against the property and people of this city, is what these 
men are themselves doing. We have indeed come to that con- 
dition of tyranny in the Capitol of this great nation when the 
rod of discharge is held over the head of every poor laborer, 
white or colored, who will not vote as the Ring dictates. The 
tyranny that makes the poor man's bread depend on the way he 
will vote is worse than slavery. 

There is another curious fact in this strange conspiracy, and 
as it seems to have escaped the notice of writers generally, I de- 
sire to call their attention to it. I need hardly say here that it is 
a fact, that it was here in Washington, a city every member of 
Congress should feel a pride in, that the first practical effort was 
made to free the nation from the disgrace of slavery. A Repub- 
lican Congress did that, and received the gratitude of the nation 
for its noble act. And it was here in Washington that a Repub- 
lican Congress made its first noble effort, and after a hard strug- 
gle succeeded in elevating the colored man to the position of a 
citizen, making him equal before the law, and a man. The na- 
tion applauded this, because it was in accordance with the spirit 
that had built up and made the Republican party great and pow- 
erful. And it was here in Washington that a Republican Con- 
gress, believed, as it were, to be acting from the purest motives, 
invested the colored man with a vote, which gave him a right to 
choose his own rulers and protect his rights as a freeman. Again 
1 say, it was here in Washington that a Republican Congress in- 
vested the colored man with all these rich and valuable gifts. Is 
it not strange above all things then, that a Republican Congress 
should have stultified itself and selected this very Washington, the 
Capitol of this great nation, as the place where the colored man 
was to be first stripped of all these rights and privileges, the right 
to vote for his rulers taken away from him, and all this at the bid 
of a mere handful of speculators ? Congress had given the poor 
colored man rich gifts, gifts that would enable him to elevate 
and improve his condition ; and a Republican Congress seized 
the first opportunity of taking them away from him in the capi- 
tal of the nation. It passed an act that deprived him of all con- 
trol over his property, if he had any, and it struck from his hands 
the right to vote for a single administrative or executive officer 
of the government. And a Republican Congress committed this 
great crime against Republican government because they were 



8 

desired to do so by less than a dozen of the most desperate specu- 
lators the world ever saw — men who went before Congress with 
falsehood on their lips and fraud in their intentions. 

Had Congress discharged its duty to the people it would have 
punished these bold, bad men for their crimes, and exposed their 
schemes. Congress did nothing of the kind. On the contrary 
it encouraged them in their schemes, and now honest people are 
suffering the result. 

FOUR MILLION DOLLARS, OR MORE, THE GREAT OBJECT. 

~No sensible man ever supposes for a moment that the men I have 
referred to, and'their confederates in crime, ever cared anything 
for good government. Kespect for law is something foreign to 
their intentions. ^You encompass the motives of such men in 
the word money. The acts of government, as employed to pro- 
mote the interests of a people and elevate mankind, such men as 
these never made a part of their study. Their highest object in 
this world is to accumulate wealth, and to that one thing all 
their energies are directed. Body and soul are devoted to that, 
and when, as very often is the case, they have accumulated 
wealth by the meanest of means, they assert the right to use it 
as a political power. Such men as these, generally vulgar and 
ambitious, have always been the very worst enemies of Repub- 
lican Government. And this for the very reason that their high- 
est knowledge of government is that it shall be made a means of 
profit to themselves. Few thing- could more forcibly illustrate 
this than what I am about to relate. There is something won- 
derful in the attractive power of $4,000,000. I know of nothing 
more attractive except it be $8,000,000. Give me " $4,000,000. 
and I will guarantee to corrupt the whole political life of any 
city in this great Republic. You may pit all the clergymen of 
the city against me, and yet I will do it, which is only a proof 
that piety has no chance against money," said a member of Con- 
gress to me once. It was always so, all over the world, from the 
days of Adam down to the days of U. Sidney Grant. Money is 
the great golden calf of the day; and the way we bow down be- 
fore it, and worship it, is something that would astonish even 
the oldest of Romans. 

It was, I assert here, and without any fear of contradiction, 
the power of $4,000,000, and perhaps $8,000,000, that found the 
desperate men I have alluded to before Congress asking for an 
organic act that would give them the power to tax and oppress 
the people, and spend that amount of money. Constrained by 



their own necessities these desperate men saw, or rather fancied 
they saw, relief for themselves in getting so large an. amount of 
the people's money to spend. Hence it was that only three 
years ago these very same m< n, moved by the same selfish mo- 
tives, went before Congress and coolly asked for an appropria- 
tion of three or four millions of dollars — and for what ? To get 
up a " Great World's Fair in Washington " The press of the 
country did its duty in exposing that scheme of fraud, and it was 
kicked out of Congress. And that is what Congress should have 
done with this twin scheme to destroy our municipal government 
and erect a monarchy in its place. Mr. Shepherd and Mr. Kil- 
bourn were the great moving spirits >n that grand " World's 
Fair" scheme. "Give us money to put the building up," said 
the former in a speech, "aid the thing will run itself." He 
undoubtedly meant that the thing would " run itself " after they 
had got and spent the three or four million dollars appropriated 
by Congress. This gentleman is now the moving spirit of our 
Board of Public Works, and the manner in which our " im- 
provements " are being conducted is the best proof that the 
" running itself" policy i~ being strictly carried out. 

There is no longer any doubt that these men went before Con- 
gress on false pretenses, and deceived Congress into granting 
their request for a change of government. The Kepublicans 
were deluded with the pretence that we were to have a less ex- 
pensive and more simplified form of government. Democrats 
were told that a change of government was necessary to get rid 
of the predominant influence of the " negro vote " in this Dis- 
trict. That was the most fascinating bait that could have been 
used just at that time to catch such Democrats as Eldridge of 
Wisconsin and Fernando Wood of New York, and they swal- 
lowed it without a wink. (A Democrat will swallow anything ) 
And with the aid of these Democrats our schemers carried their 
point. 

THE SORT OF MONARCHY W r E HAVE GOT. 

People in many parts of the country have been deceived with 
the idea that the District of Columbia was ten miles square. 
Seven miles one way and five another would be nearer the 
truth. Topographically speaking, it is about one-sixth the size 
of a Saxe Coburg Prince's principality. But I will take a dozen 
C«burg Prince's principalities, and throw iu all the New Eng- 
land States, and it will outdo them all in the amount of money it 
takes to run it and can squander on foolishness. And it will also 
beat them in the complicated nature of its machinery of A gov» 



10 

ernment and the swell and pomp it can put on. It is in truth 
the most magnificent and yet the most expensive satire on gov- 
ernment the world ever saw. And I say it with a feeling of 
shame rather than sadness, that for this we are indebted to a 
^Republican Congress. It was the natural result of taking from 
our people, white and colored, the right to choose their own 
rulers and concentrating the power in the hands of the Presi- 
dent of the United States. Under our new government the peo- 
ple are not permitted to vote for any one of their executive or 
administrative officers. That right was taken away from them 
and the powetf invested in the President ; and how he has abused 
that power, by filling nearly all the important offices with men 
he was engaged with in speculations and Rings, is well known to 
the country. A more severe blow at republican government 
never was struck in this or any other country. It virtually re- 
pudiated the people's judgment, aid exposes them to the dan- 
gers of an irresponsible one man power — the very kind of gov- 
ernment we are now suffering from. And for this also we are 
indebted to a Republican Congress. 

The experience of a single year has also shown that the people's 
judgment was superior to the President's. They would have 
selected the men best qualified to fill the offices of trust — men 
whom the people respected and had confidence in. He selected 
men the people had more than once shown by their ballots that 
they had no confluence in. 

We have a Governor who surrounds himself with a military 
staff, of which he seems very proud. This Governor was appointed 
by President Grant, and is his business partner in the Seneca sand- 
stone business. Then we have a Secretary of State and Assistant 
Secretary of State, and all for the government of a " Territory," 
(that's the name we give the thing,) seven by five miles. Then 
we have get a council, a sort of pocket edition of the House of 
Lords. But although monarchical in spirit and semblance it 
bears no relation to the House of Lords. I say this because one 
of its members invariably spells Jesus with a small j, and an- 
other signs his name with an X. Then we have got a Board 
of Public Works, which includes the Governor, and is the most 
expensive body the world has any account of. The members 
of the Council are appointed by the President, and I am not 
aware that he has a relative in it. That remarkable body, the 
Board of Public Works, too, is appointed by the President, and 
one at least of its members is a partner of his in real estate and 
other speculations. This Board of Public Works is another 



II 

of President Grant's appointments ; and anything more disgrace- 
ful could not well be imagined. 

" I have a right to do as I damn please," said one of its mem- 
bers a few days ag3 to a citizen who had come to remonstrate 
against the destruction of his property. And this Board of Pub- 
lic Works (so called) arrogates to itself executive, administra- 
tive, legislative, and judicial powers. It takes possession of the 
people's property, spends their money, and drives them from 
their homes to live on charity ; and yet the people have no re- 
dress. President Grant has elevated the reckless men who com- 
pose this Board into almost absolute power, and yet the people 
can only look on while their substance is being squandered and 
feel how helpless they are. 

We have seen what rights were taken from the people by a Re- 
publican Congress. Let us see what was left to them. The bar- 
ren privilege was vouchsafed to them of voting for members of 
what was called a legislature and a delegate in Congress. But 
it very soon turned out that this was no boon at all, and that the 
Board of Public works had the power to go into any district in 
the city, and through the influence of labor elect every member 
«f this so called legislature, and also the delegate in Congress. 
The Board of Public Works, not the people, elects this extraor- 
dinary legislature. And again we have the natural result of 
one man power in this strange legislature, which is one of the 
most stupid, illiterate, and venal bodies the world ever saw. 
One of our wits has called it a House of Commons. But it is a 
very common hou?e of Commons. Two of its members, I am told, 
cannot even write their names. In short, it is the cleverest satire 
on legislation within my knowledge. It can pass the most re- 
markable laws, and with the most remarkable rapidity. But 
it would require at least a dozen Doctors of Law to get sense out 
of them, or tell what they really meant. And it will vote, at 
the bid of the Board of Public Works, any amount of money, 
and that without knowing where a dollar of it is to come from. 
If this is not a monarchy, and unlimited at that, I should like 
to know what it is ? Such a concern is certainly a disgrace to 
Republican government. 

But we call this a Territorial Government. It is nothing of 
the kind. It is simply an old fashioned British Colonial Gov- 
ernment, with the very worst features of that style of govern- 
ment retained. And by destroying a municipal government 
and erecting the one we have now got in its place, a Republican 
Congress retrograded fifty years in legislation. Take the organic 



12 

act under which this so called Territorial Government was es- 
tablished and compare it with the system of government in force 
in the North American British Colonies fifty years ago, and 
you will find that they are identical. Then the Crown mani- 
fested its want of confidence in the people by appointing one of 
its relatives or favorites to govern the colony. As a general 
thing this governor knew very little of the people, and nothing 
of their real wants, Like the governor of our little " Territory' 
he had his military staff and a large retinue of retainers, all liv- 
ing at the expense of the people. And yet, like our governor, 
he was little more than an expensive nonentity. The Colonial 
Governor, by and with the consent of the Crown, appointed the 
members of his Council, a sort of Upper House, and in fact filled 
all the executive and administrative offices of any importance- 
The only elective power vouchsafed to the people was that of 
electing members to the colonial legislature. And even this 
power was restricted to the narrower limits of the property 
holders. In short, the Crown did then exactly what President 
Grant is doing now in Washington. As under the old colonial 
system, we have taxation in all its worst forms without repre- 
sentation. Thus we passed almost imperceptibly from a respon- 
sible to an irresponsible personal government. 

The Colonial Council was generally composed of high old fogy 
favorites, unprogressive, good Tories, and strong believers in the 
a^iom that the King could do no wrong. In that they bore a 
strong resemblance to those Senators whom Grant calls his own. 
The Council and the Legislature never got along well together. 
The foimer were continually wanting to move backward; the 
latter to press forward in the interests of the people. They rarely 
agreed, and indeed seemed to be moved by different instincts 
and influences. Finding at length that this sort of government 
was little more than an oppressive yoke about their necks, the 
people rose in their might and demanded a reform and a govern- 
ment in which they should be more fairly and justly represented. 
But they were only successful after a struggle of twenty years. 
It was a monarchical government in its worst form and features ; 
and yet that is the very kind of government a Republican Con- 
gress gave us a little more than a year ago, and from the bad 
effects of which our people are now suffering. 



Noti-.— These letters were written more than a year ago 



OUR LITTLE MONARCHY. 



Letter TNTo. 2. 

Truth does not covet darkness ; integrity always invite? in- 
vestigation. 

What is called our Territorial government was hardly inaugu- 
rated when it became apparent to every right thinking man that 
the men into whose hands President Grant had given almost ab- 
solute power, were bent on committing some great crime. " If 
these men are honest in their promises to give us a better gov- 
ernment, and improve the city," people asked one of another, 
'• what need is there of spending all this money to silence the 
press and purchase the influence of venal men ?" 

One hundred and fifty-three thousand dollars of the people's 
money spent to silence the press! And yet these men, so prof- 
ligate in the use of the people's money, say we must not chal- 
lenge their intentions. That was what slavery used to say to us. 
Slavery, the curse of the land, covered its enormities exactly in 
that way. 

I know of no viler use you can put journalism to than that of 
making it an instrument to shield crime ; and the men who have 
no more respect for its high mission than to use it as such are 
simply a disgrace to the profession. 

. The country has already been made familiar with the kind of 
men President Grant appointed for our '• Board of Public 
Worlcs." But why President Grant appointed these men has 
not yet been told. He had known them only as paving contract- 
ors and plumbers and gas fitters. It seemed never to have oc- 
curred to him that a contractor, intrusted with power to control 
contracts, would very naturally use his trust as a means of mak- 
ing the most money for himself. 

No sooner had these men been appointed to power than they 
proceeded to take charge of everything within their reach. They 
took possession of our governor, an easygoing, good natured gen- 
tleman, who affected religion and Sunday schools. But what was 
more than all else in President ('rant 's estimation he was a banker. 



14 

They took possession of our council, a body vouchsafed us by Con- 
gress, and familiarly known as our House of Lords. And when our 
legislature, another remarkable body vouchsafed us by Congress, 
and familiarly known as our very common House of Commons, 
was elected, they proceeded at once to gobble it up. Not only 
that; the Board of Public Works, so-called, made oi' this re- 
markable legislature a tail piece of the very smallest dimensions. 
The Board had only to raise its linger and this remarkable body 
called a legislature would pass laws such as man never beard of 
before. As for appropriations, it began voting them with a reck- 
lessness that made the " oldest inhabitants " look on with fear 
and trembling. 

The Board also made a desperate effort to get possession oi' the 
Board of Health, a very yeasty body, composed of a number of 
big and little pill doctors. Now thesedoctors were sharp fellows, 
and although much given to quarreling among themselves., stub- 
bornly refused to surrender to Mr. President Grant's plumbers 
and bummers oi' tin; Board of Public Works. In short, the doe- 
tors treated their assailants as if they were a pestilence, to be 
kept at a distance with the free use of physic. 

It soon became evident to all right thinking men that we had 
a Boss Tweed in Washington, and that he had improved on the 
methods the original W. 31. had introduced into the local im- 
provements of New York. The only difference was thai 
Boss Tweed was a particular friend of the President, and gained 
all the importance he had from that source. 

Having spread itself over everything, and taken possession of 
everything, our Board of Public Works proceeded l 
with such extraordinary haste a- to excite a suspicion thai 
largest amount of plunder was to be done in the shortest space 
of time. Avenues, streets, alleys, and highways were torn up 
or cut down with a haste and violence that foretold an immense 
destruction of property. 

I would have my reader believe me when I say it began to 
look as if the architect of Little Pedlington had come to life 
again, and was at work with the evil intention of taking Wash- 
ington entirely off i;s feet. 

The Board of Public Work.-, encouraged and protected by 
President Grant, at once set itself above law, above right, above 
justice. Small property holders were widely told if they could 
not pay for having their property improved, and improved ac- 
cording to the "comprehensive plan, T ' they must 



15 



" GIT UP AND GIT." 

The meaning of this cruel vulgarism was that if these poor 
people could not pay for such improvements as our Boss Tweed 
chose to put on their property, theymust sell out to his strikers, 
and at such prices as they choose to pay. 

These men talked and acted as if they were intoxicated with 
power. And. in their wild, reckless career of " improvement 
robbery : ' it is strange that not a thought was given to the neces- 
sities of tin- poor, [ndeed it is a painful fact that this speculat- 
ing administration lias so favored the schemes of the rich and 
the dishonest that there never \va.-. a time in Washington when 
the wants of the laboring man and the poor were so little under- 
stood and so much neglected. 

It was the audacity of the way this " Honorable Board of 
Public Works " went to work tearing Washington up by the 
roots, and threatening us with a deluge of wood and tar pave- 
ments, that gave tin- first signal of alarm to our people. And 
yet, while this destruction was going on before their eyes, and 
Hi' objeel of it apparent to every one, the people were told to 
keep perfectly quiet — that like Grant's administration for purity, 
they were in the end going to give us a government "fearfully 
economical." That was a deception which they had played on 
Congre - with considerable effect. But our people were not to 
be deceived so easily. They knew the men they had to deal 
witli better than Congress did, and a single year's experience 
shows how correct were their predictions. Our citizens knew 
that at least two <»f these men, and these the most grasping and 
unscrupulous and selfish, were associated with President Grant 
in speculations. 

Each member of the " Board of Public Works" began illus- 
trating bis love for economy in administering the government 
by setting up ;) carriage and horses and living in a style of show 
and extravagance nearly or (pule up to the. bad example set 
them by the President himself. And all this on the small sal- 
of $2,500 a year. No doubt these gentlemen were acting on 
the belief that the Hoard of Public Works was a great thing, 
and appearances must be kept up — that the new government 
must look elegant on the outside, no matter how much dirt and 
rottenness was concealed within. 

Our tine old City Hall, where our old municipal government, 
which these very men had described as insufferably extravagant, 
had found ample accommodations free of charge, was neither 
spacious nor elegant enough for our new monarchy. The thing 



16 

we were to have so simple and unpretending, turned out to be 
very fond of show, and to have very extravagant habits. To 
use a cant phrase, it was as fond of upholstery as an upstart. Lt 
was not a big government, topographically speaking, but it 
could get on such an amount of finery. Business must be done 
in the very highest order of deportment. And there must be 
Brussels carpets, great mirrors with elaborately gilt frames, 
frescoed ceilings, and black walnut furniture, all carved, in the 
rooms where this very small, but very costly government was to 
be administered. The big magnates, whatever that is, of the 
new government, were not to be brought in contact with the 
small magnates. They must not only be located in different 
buildings but in different parts of the city. 

Our citizen governor, with his military staff — I mean the great 
historical sandstone man and Grant's partner in government 
contracts for stone — had an unoccupied building on the corner 
of Pennsylvania avenue and Seventeenth street. That is at the 
west or fashionable end of the city. Now our good governor is 
a great financial moralist, if you know what that means. He 
can carry the Young Men's Christian Association, the Freed- 
men's Bank, the Freedmen's Bureau, and any number of prayer 
meetings at th^ same time. And he believes, or rather says he 
does, that a national debt is a national blessing. Whether for 
the rich man or the poor man he has not yet vouchsafed to tell 
us. Of course it occurred to our good governor, with the mili- 
tary staff, that it would not do to have that building remain 
without a tenant. So our governor had it put in thorough re- 
pair and fitted up at the people's expense for the especial accom- 
modation of himself and his secretary of state, rent $2,000 a 
year. My reader will, I am sure, appreciate the high financial 
morality of that little transaction. 

" The Honorable Board of Public Works " did somewhat dif- 
ferent It rented a row of four ill-contrived, small, dark, ami 
very cheaply built houses, with passages and stairs so narrow 
that two ordinary sized persons could not pass without an effort, 
in Four-and-a-half street, at the unfashionable end of the city, 
at a rental of $4, COO a year. That was economy for you ! The 
men Grant selected for our masters did that. Two thousand dol- 
lars a year would have been a liberal rent. What kind of per- 
suasion it was that induced the owner to accept this unreasonable 
rent I have not yet been able to ascertain. Of course, the • 
buildings were not strong enough to bear up under the heavy 



17 

weight of our Board of Public Works. An architect was called 
in to devise a "comprehensive plan " of putting them in order. 
This at first blush seemed somewhat strange, considering that the 
Board of Public; Works included that great American architect, 
(Mullett,) imported not many years ago, and who was known 
to be a man after Grant's own heart. The architect went 
to work as directed, and when he had done his work found 
that the bills amounted to $87,000. The Honorable Board of 
Public Works effected to believe itself astonished at the amount. 
But it was not astonished at all. The architect, known to be an 
honest man, had merely carried out the " comprehensive plan " 
of improving these miserable buildings according to orders. 
Now the lease of these buildings only ran four years, and to put 
$87,000 worth of improvements on them, and the " improve- 
ments" to'be the owner's at the end of four years, every sensible 
man will admit is the most extraordinary piece of economy this 
community at least has any account of. 

That whole thing' was properly understood here in Washing- 
ton, but is of a piece with the way everything has been done 
under Grant's administration. The Little Pedlington archi- 
tect of the Board of Public Works effected to be very much an- 
noyed at Mr. Searle, the architect employed. But Mr. Searle 
only did his duty in carrying out orders, and confessed that with 
this $87,000 he could have put up a building that would have 
been an honor to the city. To put $87,000 worth of improve- 
ments on four cheap and meanly-constructed houses, leased for 
four years, will strike the thoughtful reader as bad for a begin- 
ning. There was something in this transaction that indicated 
hands that were not clean. Such are the scandals we have to 
sillier here in Washington, and such are the scandals President 
Grant finds it in his heart to approve and applaud in his mes- 
sage to Congress. 

The very expensive upholstery. 5Tes, and our Boss Shep- 
herd's plumbing and gas fitting bills was what so swelled this 
amount. No one, not even the Little Pedlington architect, dis- 
puted Mr. Shepherd's bills. Why? Because he was the << Vice 
President," so called, of the " Board of Public Works," and, if 
report be true, was granted the privilege of auditing his own bills. 
That is the way we do things under our new and very economi- 
cal government. Bullock, of Georgia, and Scott of South Caro- 
lina, understood and practiced this kind of financial philosophy 
exaetly, and the result is before the people. 



• 18 

Well, it was in the building I have referred to that the Board 
of Public Works set up it> empire. I say empire because there 
was a mock grandeur about the thing, I hardly know what to 
cull it, 1 always did admire, and would have admired more had 
it not been so expensive. I had been studying Hayti, politically 
and socially, for twenty years. 1 bad been foolish enough to 
write a book on Hayti ; but for expense, for cheap pomp ami 
circumstance, our territorial government, so-called, could beat 
Hayti. I say this modestly. Ours had and Hayti had not its 
" grand burettei of contracts," with an officer of the milil 
rank of colonel for chief of bureau. We had and Hayti had not 
a " grand bureau of picks and shovels," with an officer of the 
military rank of major for chief of bureau. And we had our 
" grand bureau of gas pipes and water closets," with an office] 
of the rank of colonel for chief of bureau Not to be i 
on military rank, so far . majors and colonels, I may 

add that we h i d highways," with Briga- 

dier General Balloch (brevet) of the Freedmen's Bureau for 
chief of bureau. Heaven knows we had bureaus enough, and 
chiefs of burea : -<- for a big empire, and all drawing 

aries that would surprise the outside world. As Mr. Dickens 
said, not to put too fine a point on it, the big salaries were the 
first on the list; the amount of work the last to be considered 
I bad almost forgotten to mention that we have a " bureau of 
sewers," the chief of which complains that he is d »1 designated 
by his military title. 

Our House of Commons, elected by the people, with the aid 
of the Board of Public Works, and our House of Lords, ap- 
pointed by the President; these are the i trkable bodies 
history, ancient or modern, has any account of. These *reat, 
grave, and dignified bodies, so high and yet so low, made a com- 
promise between the Governor and Board of Public W 
called, and settled down in a place called " Metzerott Hall," on 
Pennsj Ivania avenue. As the House of Commons were a drink- 
[f not an eating body, the location was well selected. The 
rent for these comfortable quarter 000 a year. I have 

, ,i these items merelj to -how what a very economical 
ernment we have got, compared, 1 mean, with our old municipal 
rnment, and the extent of our territory. We can spend 
a million dollars now under this very economical government 
where we used to spend a thousand under our old and "very 
extravagant government." But then we have got gentlemen 



19 

skilled in the arl of doing these things. These gentlemen also 
say they :tre not robbers, and T do not say they are ; things, both 
commercially and morally, are so strangely changed now. On 
that point! would much rather submit the question as to what 
constitutes a public robber to the public. 

Robbers may be differently classed. There are legal and ille- 
gal robbers, one plundering the people under a legal disguise, 
the other openly and deliantly pursuing his vocation in defiance 
of law or the rights of property. The law makes a distinction ; 
but I have never yet been able to discover where the crime of 
the ono was a whit less than the other. The highwayman sees 
the penitentiary before him and takes the chances — your money 
or your life. Your "public improver" is none the less a rob- 
ber. He demand- your money or your property; he outrages 
society quite as much as the highwayman ; but he has made his 
e with the law beforehand, and feels that he may still rob 
and be protected by law and the officers elected to administer it. 

And here again 1 am compelled to moralize. The world's 
literature has been full oi' the exploits of great and skilful rob- 
bers. And 1 have always found that where great and skilful 
robbers set oul on their career of crime, the ingenuity employed 
in their mode of securing plunder was only equalled by their 
manner of calculating the chan ape. 

Our public robbers were not an exception to this rule. They 
found it necessary to have a law of Congress to shield fraud, and 
a law adviser wh i would be always ready with opinions t" suit 
the required circumstances, and who would not be over nice, 
legally, in construing law to meet necessities. That was robbery 
protected by law. in that the Board of Public Works fancied 
itself secure. But nothing is secure against public opinion. 

In order to make the road to the robbery complete, it was 
essary to have a city treasurer who would "pay out," keep 
.-ilent. understand the value of division, and pay over without 
caring or knowing what the law in i : as. To fill the 

office of law adviser, our highly moral governor .. man 

• very worstch iracter in Washington — a man no 
one respected, no one had any confidence in, and everybody 
loathed. That our good and pious govern* . Cooke, 

should have taken this bad and notorious character into his 
fidenee and employ shocked every right minded man in Wash- 
ington. This man had done much to bring disgrace on Mayor 
Sayles J. Bo wen's administration. And yet the very men who had 



'20 

been loudest in condemning this notorious man, and describing 
him as unfit to hold any office of trust, now took him into their con- 
fidence and employ, as if they had found in him a tool ready to do 
any sort of work they needed. It was the appearance of this 
notorious man, as a law adviser of this new government, and his 
skill in the art of political rascality, that shocked and 
alarmed our people. If this Honorable Board of Public Works 
was disposed to be honest, why did it employ men condemned as 
scoundrels out of their own mouths? Washington had honest 
men enough in the legal profession ; what necessity had the 
Board of Public Works to employ men i f . had before declared 
unworthy of trust? Philosophically the whole thing reduces 
itself down to a question of right in property between respecta- 
ble and thinking people on one side, and plunderers and their 
ignorant followers on 'the other. 

Let us turn from this man to the man appointed treasurer of 
the District. Here the criminal intention culminated. In ap- 
pointing a treasurer to guard millions of the people's money, one 
would naturally suppose that integrity, experience as an ac- 
countant, and a man known to the people generally for his com- 
mercial morality, would have been chosen as the guardian proper 
of the people's money. But all these essentials of character 
were entirely disregarded. A convenient tool was found in an 
uneducated, obsequious, and very illiterate colored man of the 
name of Johnson. Johnson was just the man to pay out and ask 
no questions, if the big " buckra man" demanded. I have 
known Johnson for many years. I have been a friend of his 
race. But I never thought he was a good example of his rae£ 
Not long ago this very same Johnson kept a small barber shop 
on the avenue, but not being much of a barber he did not suc- 
ceed. He added to the art of a barber the profession of a boot- 
black ; and yet he did not succeed. Johnson's genius was not 
quite up to either of these. He then went into the oyster busi- 
ness, and served stews, roasts, fries, and broHs to hungry Con- 
gressmen at the restaurant of the Capitol. How these occupa- 
tions, shaving, blacking boots, and serving oysters in every style 
to hungry Congressmen could have qualified » man in all the 
mysteries of finance and rendered him capable of being a til 
custodian of millions of the people's money, it will be very dif- 
ficult for ordinary minds to understand. And yet there is one 
thing the thoughtful reader will very readily understand, and 
that is the motive our rulers bad in putting a 'nan in every way 



21 

unfit in such a place. The Honorable Board of Public Works 
was composed of men in desperate circumstances, financially, aDd 
with Johnson the custodian of the people's money, they would 
be li carried out safe.' ; And yet these are some of the transac- 
tions which General Grant endorses and commends to Congress, 
and for the only reason that the men who are perpetrating them 
are his associates and partners in speculations. 



Note.— Perhaps I have done this colored man an injustice. Find- 
ing that he was not quite up to the requirements of the Ring— in a 
word, that he kept his cash account unpleasantly straight, and was 
not inclined to pay out and ask no questions, the Board set John- 
son aside, and made a treasurer of one of its own members. The 
gentleman signs himself" Treasurer of the Board of Public Works,'* 
an office unknown to the law. 

The Auditor, Richards, was found to be too honest a man for the 
purposes of the Ring. He, also, was set aside, and an auditor of their 
own appointed. 



OUR LITTLE MONARCHY. 



Letter JSTo. 3. 

" The orgapic act." under which this monarchy of ours was 
created, not only placed the city of Washington under the con- 
trol of five unscrupulous speculators, but, as they claimed, gave 
them the power to issue bonds and mortgage the city to whomso- 
ever they pleased. The very thought of the capital city of this 
great nation, and representing the nation as it does, being mort- 
gaged to a foreign people is repugnant to the feelings of every 
honest minded American. And yet it is a reality at this time. 
These desperate men lost no time in taking advantage of every 
power the law invested them with. They issued their four million 
dollars of bonds, fraudulently, as has been proven before a com- 
mittee of Congress, and their next highest object seemed to be 
as to who would buy and pay the monoy for them, and how 
quick they could spend it. 

But it was found necessary to go beyond this country, beyond 
England, into a country where the English language was neither 
spoken nor understood — in a word, among innocent Germans, be- 
fore purchasers for their illegally issued bonds could be found. 
And then it was found necessary to impose them on these inno- 
cent people through a trick and a fraud that only the meanest 
kind of a sharper would have resorted to. It was reported 
abroad that these bonds were issued by special act of Congress, 
than which nothing could be farther from the truth. Congress 
had nothing whatever to do with the issuing of these bonds. 
And unless I am very much mistaken Congress will have nothing 
to do with paying them. The men who practiced this triek may 
regard themselves as very clever ; but the fact that they imposed 
on innocent purchasers will be none the less apparent, and in 
the end will inflict a stain on our national character. 

Any one at all acquainted with the history of the Mississippi 
and Florida bonds, and the trick by which the latter was im- 
posed on the English purchasers, will find an exactly parallel 
ease in this. The case of the Florida bonds was the most flagrant. 



2S 

Florida was a territory then, and her government was in the 
hands of a set of desperate men, whom no one at home would 
trust. But they must have money, and when they could not get 
it by fair means they resorted to foul. They issued their bonds 
to the amount of one million and a half of dollars, and inserted 
in the body of them, in conspicious type, that they were issued 
by special act of Congress, and that Florida being a territory 
the Government of the United States was responsible for their 
payment. And in this way they were put upon the English 
market through an American agent, and the innocent purchasers 
defrauded out of their money. Not one dollar, principal or in- 
terest has ever been paid on these bonds, and like those of Mis- 
sissippi they stand to day a warning to those who purchased 
them and a reproach on our commercial integrity. 

The writer of this was in London in 1854, and present when 
the holders of these Florida bonds appeared by counsel before 
the Mixed Commission for the settlement of all outstanding 
claims between England and the United States since 1812, and 
listened to their appeal for justice. But their appeal was made 
in vain, as their claim was not oae which came within the scope 
of the Commission to adjudicate. It was acknowledged that 
these bondholders had been made the victims of a scandalous 
fraud. The same species of deception was practiced by the 
Territorial Government of Washington a little more than a year 
ago in issuing four million dollars of bonds and placing them 
on the German market. And it is quite safe to predict that de- 
mand for their payment will be attended with similar dishonor. 
The perpetrators of this wrong, however, flatter us with the as- 
surance that as the money for these bonds were used to improve 
Washington, Congress will step in and assume their payment. 
In other words, that having perpetrated one great wrong, Con- 
gress will be called on to perpetrate another by voting away four 
millions of the people's money to save the honor of the nation, 
and make good an amount, one-third of which it is safe to say 
went into the pockets of the men who originally perpetrated 
the fraud. 

President Grant having selected his friends and associates in 
business for a Board of Public Works — having, as it were, 
placed our city and its government in the hands of Alexander 
K. Shepherd and his fancy pavement conti actors, it soon be- 
came apparent to our people that they intended to use their power 
to increase their own profits and enlarge their political patron- 



24 

age. That "comprehensive system of improvements," like 
Tweed's, was a signal to our people, where stealing was to be- 
gin and incompetence end. 

Proposals were invited for paving, grading and doing all 
sorts of work. That was merely a sham. The " Board" did 
not want proposals ; did not want fair competition. Fair com- 
petition would have interfered with their own profits. When 
proposals were sent in those who had made them were coolly 
informed by the " Board" that they had been annulled, and a 
scale of prices for work established. This was exactly what 
William M. Tweed did in New York, and Mr. Shepherd knew 
the value of following his example. 

In very many cases these " Board prices " were fixed at 
higher rates than responsible contractors had offered to do the 
work for. This was conspicuously so in the prices fixed for pav- 
ing. Not more than two years ago Mr. Nicholson put a speci- 
men of his wood pavement down at the Capitol, at $3.0 j per 
square yard. The Board of Public Works "fixed " the price 
for Stow and other wood pavements at $3.40 and $3.60 per square 
yard. I need scarcely assert here that it was because members 
of the Board were themselves interested in these paving jobs that 
the prices were fixed so high, and the people robbed. If con- 
tractors outside of the Eing had been allowed to come in and 
bid for work promiscuously, what would have become of the 
Metropolis Paving Company, in which members of the Ping 
were known to be stockholders ? 

It was noticed, also, that wherever Shepherd and his Ping 
confederates had any property there the largest amount of im- 
provement was sure to be going on, at the people's expense. In 
short the people's money was literally squandered. In regard to 
paving the streets they proceeded in a manner that set even decen- 
cy aside, parcelling out the contracts among themselves and th< j ir 
Ring friends. For the first time in Washington we had the 
singular announcement nearly every day that the contract for 
paving certain streets had been offered to and accepted by Mr. 
So and So. And this Mr. So and So was almost sure to be the 
President, Secretary, or some one of the Metropolis Paving Com- 
pany King, or the Seneca Stone Ring, in which President Grant 
figures so conspicuously. If President Grant does not under- 
stand the meaning of all this speculation, fraud and outrage that 
is going on here in Washington, it is because he shuts his eyes 
to it, and is criminally indifferent to what is going on around 



25 

him. Had he been in Washington attending to the duties of 
his high office and giving some little attention to what was go- 
ing on at the capital instead of smoking his cigar and indulg- 
ing his weakness for frivolity at Long Branch he might at least 
have gained such information as would have saved him from the 
humiliation of appearing before the American people as an 
apologist for robberies, beside which those committed by William 
M. Tweed and his gang are as trifling. 

When General Grant appointed these men to office, friends, 
whose advice he should have taken, went to him and warned 
him as to what would be the consequences. He was told by 
these friends, who had no other motive than to see his govern- 
ment succeed, that the men into whose hands he had entrusted 
the city were men the property holders had no confidence in ; 
that they were notorious as speculators and contractors ; that 
they were men incapable of appreciating a great public trust; 
that they would violate their trust and turn their offices into a 
means of robbing the people and filling their own pockets. 
And that is exactly what they have done. They have created 
for Washington the smallest specimen of a monarchy the sun 
shines on, a debt of thirteen million dollars in as many months ;. 
they have mortgaged the city to foreigners ; and all we have 
got to show for it is a few streets and avenues paved with wood 
and concrete pavements. And if the experience of other cities 
be worth anything it is safe to say that in three years from this 
time we shall be worse off for pavements than ever before. 

But these gentlemen were men after President Grant's own 
heart. They were vulgar, selfish men, whose highest ambition 
was to make money, and unscrupulous as to the means they used. 
President Grunt admired these men; and so did the Ring con- 
tractors. Yea, even more, the Ring contractors admired Alex- 
ander R. Shepherd so much that they sent him a delegate to the 
Philadelphia convention with " instructions " to vote for Grant. 
I thought then, and still think, that Grant got the worst of it in 
that bargain. But as that Convention was chiefly composed of 
office-holders, whose highest object was filling their own pockets, 
our contractor's man, so far as political virtue is concerned, 
must be accepted as a fair sample of the lot. 

The Committee of Congress, before which the official conduct 
of this precious Board of Public Works was investigated last 
winter, notwithstanding the persistent efforts made by a majority 
of the Committee to suppress the truth, elicited some startling 



facts. It was proved beyond question that the members of this 
Board had persistently made war on the tax payers and property 
holders ; and through their extravagance and profligacy the taxes 
Tiad been doubled in nine months ; and, that, while these reck- 
less men have filled their own pockets, and ride each one of them 
in his fine carriage, the city is literally bankrupt. The Tam- 
many Ring, in what Mr. Tweed would call its palmy days, was 
nothing to compare with our Washington Ring, as approved and 
encouraged by President Grant. The Tammany Ring robbed 
the people of New York of millions of money, and did it syste- 
matically. But the Tammany Ring gave New York improve- 
ments that Will be of lasting value, and of which she is justly 
proud. The Washington Ring have been in business a little more 
than a year, improving and stealing, and spending millions of 
the people's money, and yet we have little else than pavements, 
wood and concrete, to show for it. Property to a very large ex- 
tent has been permanently damaged, and in some instances what 
are called improvements are simply a crime against good taste. 

These men have spent, it is admitted, $280,000, improving our 
canal ; and now our great Engineer, who is no engineer at all, 
acknowledges that the whole thing is a failure. It would in- 
deed be fortunate for the people of Washington if this was the 
only failure. 

In all these transactions, selfishness, as indicated by the finger 
of our own Buss Tweed, is but too apparent. This man had a 
row of showy, cheap and badly constructed houses built on the 
corner of F and 18th streets. (He named this row of build- 
ings after General Michler, then Commissioner of Public 
Buildings and Grounds.) The architect made a grave mis- 
take in the plan, and unless F street could be lowered and drained 
they were a failure and a serious loss. Something must be done 
to make them saleable and profitable. There was a quiet, rural 
•air about F street, west of the War Department. Fine old shade 
trees stretched their branches out and gave a cool, breezy look 
to the old homesteads on either side of it. It was indeed a desir- 
able neighborhood to live in before this man Shepherd and his 
"improvers" invaded it. Shepherd wanted just six hundred 
dollars to "level the street" and make it presentable. And he 
got that six hundred dollars. But just here the great Mullett 
came in and brought his engineering skill to bear on the subject. 
Like the architect in Little Pedlington, Mullett is greatest on 
■dead levels, and a first class pretender. Mullet said — and Grant 



21 

and Boutwell had great faith in what Mullett said — that the only 
true way to improve an old city was to cut all the streets down 
as low as you could get them and get the houses up as high as 
you could. If you, according to the great Mullett, or Mullite 
as Boutwell pronounces it, had to reach your front door up 
forty steps of Seneca Stone of a slippery night, so much the 
better. The higher you lived above the street the better it was 
for your health and digestion. And to the end of carrying out 
his theory, as well as for the improvement of his friend Shep- 
herd's property, F street was cut down. Yes, in some places it 
was cut down ten and twelve feet, and the houses were left just 
as many feet above. In addition all the fine old shade trees were 
cut down. Never was a greater piece of vandalism perpetrated. 
And yet this was called an improvement. 

Pleasant old F street that was, now has the appearance of a 
dry canal with double walls of brick on each side, coped with 
Seneca Stone, and ramparts and redoubts, and the houses high 
above all. And this is what our great American engineer Mul- 
lett calls improving and beautifying the people's property. The 
residents whose property has been, as they say, damaged in this 
way, feel very much like brooming Mr. Mullett. They cannot 
sell their property at a less price than they could before the 
" Improvers" invaded the street, and hence cannot see the value 
of the improvements. But Shepherd's houses were not in the 
highest position, and hence the improvements were of real value 
to his property. This improvment of F street, which was to 
cost only $600, has already cost the people $230,000, and the 
work is not more than two-thirds done. Indeed, if the "economi- 
cal idea " of our Board of Public Works be carried out it will 
cost at least $75,COO to finish the work already begun. 

Here again the selfishness of this man Shepherd exhibited it- 
self in the very strongest light. Having the power to do so in 
himself he had F and 18th streets paved as far as his own houses. 
Beyond this, and in the rest of the Ward the streets remained 
torn up all winter, and the people left to suffer a mud blockade. 
Indeed beyond this man Shepherd's property the streets during 
the whole winter resembled General George B. McClellan's rifle 
pits after a rain storm To me no stronger proof could be pro- 
duced of the utter unfitness of these men to have charge of a great 
public trust. 

In another instance Shepherd wanted what is called the Skat- 
ing Pond property, and in order to frighten the owner into sell- 



28 

ing it, sent a gang of laborers to begin improvements. That 
was enough. Rather than be improved out of his property the 
owner offered to sell at almost any price. But just here Shep- 
herd found his modesty likely to be overturned. It would not 
do to face the owner and say " here, you poor grumbling devil," 
language quite common with him, " if you are so poor that you 
can't pay for your improvements, take this for your property 
and clear out." He sent his next best friend to do it. And that 
next best friend was my very young and much esteemed friend Ed- 
win M. Stanton. The poor, frightened property holder surren- 
dered to Stanton at once, while the modest Shepherd stood in the 
background, but seeing the bargain struck. Shepherd got the 
property for about a third of its value. The Board of Public 
Works stopped improving that property in a day or two after. 
Tweed had a way of doing these things. Like Shepherd he al- 
ways did it to accommodate and relieve the necessities of the owner 
of the property. 

Grant thinks his friend Shepherd was "smart" in getting 
that skating pond property so cheap. Again we have Shepherd 
improving his own property at the people's expense. He had 
a farm three miles out of town, on the Seventh street road.- 
With improved means of reaching the city this farm could be 
made very valuable. If, in short, a horse rail-road could be built 
to it, its valne would be more than doubled. The idea was a 
good one, but it required .more than ordinary audacity to do the 
work at the people's expense. But wken a man is in a tight 
place financially there is no knowing what he will do. A be- 
ginning was made, and the Board asked for the modest sum of 
$2,500 to improve that road to Shepherd's farm. The reader 
will be surprised to hear that the " improvements (?)" on that 
road have already cost $130,C00 ; and it will require at least 
$50,0C0 to finish them. The scamps had quietly perfected a rail- 
road scheme, and concluded that as they had a clear swing at the 
people's money, they would use it to forward their own interests, 
and to that end they put down the road-bed, graded it, and made 
it ready for the rails, and all with the people's money. Could 
audacity be carried farther? Now this road is only three miles 
long, and when you take into consideration that the very best 
of Macadamized roads only cost about $2,80 a mile, you will 
agree with me that we have introduced a new and very extra- 
ordinary system of road-making. 

These are but examples of one hundred other cases that might 



be cited to show how flagrantly these men have abused their 
trust to fill their own pockets and increase the value of their 
property. And yet President Grant looks on with indifference, 
smokes his cigar, and caresses his dogs. The people have looked 
to him in vain for redress ; and they must suffer on to the end. 
I have written enough, I think, to convince the reader that 
we have here in Washington, under the very dome of the Cap- 
itol, the smallest, meanest, and most corrupt and expensive 
Monarchy the world ever saw. 



Note.— What the debt of Washington really is, no one outside of 
the Board's Ring has been able to find. We have the funded debt, as 
given to us by the Sinking Fund Commissioners, nearly ten million 
dollars. But what the floating debt of the District amounts to, in- 
cluding, I mean, the various kinds of bonds and certificates of indebt- 
edness that have been illegally issued by the Board, is one of those 
things, to use the language of Dundreary, " No fellow can find out." 
It is safe to say, however, that the floating debt exceeds by one or 
two millions the funded ;debt, and that together they will amount 
to over twenty million dollars. Add to this the fact, that Congress 
has in a little more than a year made the following appropriations 
out of the people's money, and soma idea rnxy be formal of the ex- 
travagance of this Little Monarchy of ours. 

Appropriation under act of Jnne 10, 1872 $263,365 12 

Do do January 7, 1373 1,240,371 92 

Appropriation to reimburse the city for past expenses.. . . 1,000,000 00 
To pay the Board of Works for improvements now in 

progress 913,497 00 



Total $3,417,234 04 



30 



Nor must the fact be forgotten that the concern has onty been run- 
ning a little more than two years. Let us contrast what it costs to 
run this Little Monarchy with what it costs to run the larger cities 
of the different states of the Union. Here are the figures. It will be 
seen that we head, even New York, which has heretofore had the rep- 
utation of being the best plundered city in the country. 



Largest cities of 
States noted. 



la 



15 8 

0-1 



i 2 r - 
■irt 



.S3 



New York 4,887,464 

Maine : 626,915 

New Hampshire 318,300 
Massachusetts.. 1,457,351 
Rhode Island... 217,353 

Connecticut i 557,454 

New J erseyT — 906,096 

Ohio 2,665,260 

Wisconsin j 1,064,985 

Iowa ! 1,192,092 

Illinois 2,539,891 

Dis. o; Columbia 131,700 



47,000 

31,760 

9,280 

7.800 

1,300 

4,670 

8,320 

39,9,J0 

53,920 

55,040 

5},410| 

60) 



$139,550 
65,133 
12,341 
234,2 5 
16,908 
59,8H0 
46,187 
73275 
65,963 
41,205 
•26,753 
449,220 



M 75,000 
35,000 

9,830 
98,531 

3,500 
98,875 
82,625 
75,300 
54,569 
49,495 
5 ,000 
143,635 



$19 200 

17,400 

2,<99 

30,390 

Includ'd 

Incluci'd 

7,653 

13,250 

17,008 

22,133 

39,1 OS 

200,000 



*323, 750 
117,533 

24, _ 70 
363,036 

-.0 408 
158,675 
136,468 
183,925 
137.540 
113;i33 
115 861 
792,855 




LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 



014 369 541 4 



